But no foundation official contacted in several dozen recent interviews sees a smooth ride ahead. Even the president of the $6 billion Pew Charitable Trusts, one of the country's largest grantmakers, has been startled by the ferocity of the recent market meltdown.

"No one could have anticipated what we've been going through these last several months," Pew chief executive Rebecca Rimel said. "The size of this is staggering."

However, she said, Pew - which gave away more than $200 million in 2007 - will meet all its obligations, a point echoed by officials at every other foundation surveyed; none has received more than the usual number of calls from worried grant recipients.

"Our partners know our current commitments are secure," Rimel said.

Although next year's commitments may be secure, if financial markets remain under pressure, a serious crunch could come in 2010. Foundation endowments are generally invested in a combination of stocks, bonds and cash.

Andrew Swinney, head of the Philadelphia Foundation, a $300 million community philanthropy, said his organization would meet its current commitments and probably match them next year.

"Depending on how long and how deep this crisis is, we can probably do that," he said. "Beyond that, we may have to drop it down. . . . If there is no economic recovery in the first three quarters of 2009, then we're really going to be in a pickle this time next year."

Like many other foundation officials, he could not say precisely how much of the Philadelphia Foundation's endowment had melted away during the market swoon; some officials, like Rimel, are deliberately keeping their eyes off asset levels for the moment.

Why officials are willing to avoid obsessive worrying can be attributed to the way formal grantmaking is calculated. Though assets and endowments determine the level of giving, endowment size is generally determined by taking a multiyear average.

Such averaging - which is based on an endowment's market value on a specific date, such as the end of the third or fourth fiscal quarter - tends to "smooth out" market highs and lows, Swinney said. The Philadelphia Foundation averages its asset value over five years.

What happens when a charitable organization does not use such rolling averages can be seen by taking a look at the Phoenixville Community Health Foundation, which funds health-care and community initiatives in northern Chester County and western Montgomery County.

At the end of 2006, a year in which it gave out about $2.5 million, the foundation's endowment topped $56 million. Over the course of the deepening crisis, however, endowment value has plummeted 35 percent to 37 percent, according to Louis J. Beccaria, Phoenixville president and CEO.

As a result, the foundation dropped its asset manager and significantly cut its operating costs. "So it's tough times here," Beccaria said.

Intensifying the pressure at Phoenixville is the fact that the foundation is immediately responsible for grants that were based on the much larger, pre-meltdown endowment.

Beccaria is looking for any possible way to avoid drawing on assets to meet funding obligations. Phoenixville does not average its endowment over a period of years.

"Needless to say, next year we'll probably give out 35 to 40 percent less," he said. That will have a ripple effect throughout its service area.

"It's not like we're in a state of panic," Beccaria said. "It's not that. In 2001 and 2002, when the market went down, we had similar kinds of restrictions. This is a little tougher than that."

Though many foundation officials who use multiyear averages have avoided checking asset levels during the market meltdown, those who have done so said their endowments were down anywhere from 15 percent to 25 percent.

The Brandywine Health Foundation, for instance, which serves the Coatesville area, has suffered a typical drop. According to Frances M. Sheehan, the foundation's president and chief executive, assets stood at about $29 million at the end of December; at the end of September they had dropped to $24 million.

Sheehan said the foundation was looking to "hold the line on costs for the time being." Over the summer, Brandywine announced $2 million in new grants.

"June 30 is the end of the fiscal year," she said. "So we're going to hold the line. Come March or April, when we're making grants, we'll look at everything. But the community needs us. There aren't a lot of other sources of funding for a community like this."

Nancy Lanham, head of Delaware Valley Grantmakers, a service organization for philanthropies and foundations in the area, said an anecdotal sampling she undertook last month found, not surprisingly, that assets for most organizations had been "significantly affected" by market turmoil. Yet nearly half the 30 or so respondents said annual giving to their groups was "about the same."

In 2005 there were about 1,400 foundations based in the five-county Philadelphia area, according to data compiled by Lanham's group. They gave away more than $1 billion that year. Across Pennsylvania, foundations gave out about $1.7 billion in 2005; individuals gave $6.3 billion, both to specific organizations and to those foundations that accept donations.

According to data compiled in 2004 by the Council of New Jersey Grantmakers, the top 374 foundations in New Jersey had combined assets of about $15 billion and gave out $964 million to grantees in 2003. (A single philanthropy, the $7.9 billion Robert Wood Johnson Foundation in Princeton, represented more than half the total assets, dispensing $391 million in grants that year.)

Assets of South Jersey foundations totaled about $212 million in 2003; grants clocked in at $15.3 million.

One major area of worry for many foundations - and for regional nonprofits in general - is whether the level of individual donations will remain relatively stable. Lanham's survey suggested that, as of now, it might decline a bit.

On the other hand, for at least one small foundation - the Delaware County Community Foundation in Media - donations are running at a record pace.

"Our foundation is experiencing a great deal of activity," executive director Margaret Hendricks said. "It's far busier than it was at this point last year."

In its three-year life, the foundation has raised about $1 million. But Hendricks believes that could double "in the next six months," suggesting that looming hard times might have strengthened the philanthropic impulse among the well-to-do.

In addition to worries about funding, several foundation officials also expressed concern about the ability to meet growing and shifting problems in the community. Many said they expected increased need in social services, health care, and assistance for low-income people as the economic shakeout continues.

"I worry most about health and human services, housing, and health care," said Susan Sherman, president of the $100 million Independence Foundation, which focuses on those areas and on the arts and culture.

"We expect to meet every one of the obligations we have," she said, describing the effects of the market turmoil so far. "It's the ripple effects I worry about."